The present invention relates generally to the connection of elements made of structural foam, and more particularly to a method of connecting such elements made of structural foam, and to a connector for carrying out the method.
The use of elements made of structural foam is becoming increasingly widespread. The term "structural foam" refers to synthetic plastic foam material of the rigid or near-rigid type, of which "Styrofoam" is an example.
One of the areas where this type of structural foam, so-called because it is possible to make structures of it, building elements, and the like -- is very widely used, and with respect to which the invention will be explained hereafter, is in the toy industry. It is very common to use structural foam to simulate landscapes, buildings and the like. Heretofore, when it was necessary to connect elements of structural foam with one another, this was done by use of an adhesive. However, especially in the case of toy structures it is desired that a playing child be able to arrange the various components in many ways according to his particular wishes. If two structural-foam elements are connected with one another by means of an adhesive, they cannot subsequently be separated without damaging them. For example, if a landscape arrangement is involved, it is not subsequently possible to detach a foam element simulating a mountain from a base, and move it to another location. This is particularly objectionable in the case where such structural-foam elements are a part of or used in conjunction with a type of toy building set having a variety of components that can be assembled in different ways to resemble different structures, for instance different buildings, vehicles and the like. Unless the landscape or the like that can be simulated by means of the structural-foam elements can be accommodated to the different structures that are being built by the child with the assembly kit, the child is likely to quickly lose interest. For example, when the assembly kit has been previously used to erect dock structures and buildings of a harbor scene and the structural foam elements have been used to simulate quays and the like, the game will lose all interest for a child who subsequently assembles the elements of his toy building kit into houses of a mountain village and finds himself unable to similarly convert the harbor scene erected with the aid of the structural foam elements into a scene that is more in keeping with a mountain village, that is, for example, surrounding mountains.